I have an even deeper appreciation of the earlier iteration of this
historic track...and Roland Ehnstrom's magnificent recreation of it. It's
shocking to see how dinky the track itself has become, festooned with fussy
little chicanes, even as the tribunes have become ever more grandiose. (Of
course, it's also shocking to see how narrow the pit straight was, even 12
years after Levegh's horrific accident.) In Roland's version, I love the
truncated escape roads--more like turn-arounds--where you can avoid getting
beached on those treacherous sand banks (now gone...along with most of the
rest of the charm of the old track). I also love the danger of scattering
the engines in GPL; reliability has rarely been a strategic factor in the
game.
You can create your own 8-hour mini-Le Mans by setting the number of laps in
the 67season.ini entry to 424, which gives you 128 laps (the max GPL will
score) in Intermediate Long (the highest mode that will support a Shift-R).
If you can squeeze 32 laps from a tankful of gas, you'll need to refuel 3
times (abt. every 2 hours) to complete the 1071-mile race. A more
practical maximum for online racing might be an Intermediate Short, 64
laps, with one Shift-R. In a Novice test (unaccountably 34 laps, not 32),
I ran out of gas at Tetre Rouge on the last lap in the Lotus.
The undersized Brabham holds 43 gallons, good for a theoretical 30
laps. The Brobdingagian BRM and Honda both carry 50 (!) gallons/32 laps;
the others are all 46/32. Warning: the handling suffers plenty with full
fuel loads (50 gallons = 300 lbs.).
I'd be willing to host and/or participate in an online feasibility run, if
anybody's interested, but please let's cap the number of Shift-Rs so
nobody's tempted to try the obvious: a light fuel load and a ton of
Shift-Rs. Email me.